Heavy Bolters vs. Assault Cannon, Some [b]Important[/b] Facts

[Carl]

I keep seeing a lot of talk about how Assault Cannon are inferior to H.Bolters. This comes up a lot in Never-ending Hail of Devastation vs. Assault Cannon Arguments.

So here's some basic facts to consider when comparing the two, (the most important is last and will use bold text for emphasis.

1. Heavy Bolters fire at a higher RoF but for a shorter burst, (NEHoD aside), they have a shorter cooldown however and a longer reload frequency. This means they put slightly over double the shots down range per second prior to other modifiers.

2. Assault cannons typically have a littlie under double the per shot damage. This means the base DPS of a Heavy Bolter before modifiers is fractionally greater than that of an assault cannon.

3. Assault Cannons use a different weapons type. This means with one exception they get significant accuracy increases over heavy bolters. Typically around double.

4. Assault Cannons damage type does equal or greater damage against all target types. In particular it has greater than double the damage multiplier vs. CSM and vehicle target types.

5. The NEHoD has a roughly 50% increase in average RoF over a normal H.Bolter.

6. AVitus has Focus Fire, this gives a significant damage increase. As such any item which gives +Energy on hit gives him a marked increase in real observed DPS, (which cannot easily be calculated, but for every +4 energy he gets, he receives another second of focus fire benefit).

7. The in game listed DPS does NOT take account of accuracy or damage multipliers for the weapon in question.


What all this means is that against most targets, (and especially against CSM or equivalent), an Assault Cannon does 2-4X it's listed DPS when compared to a Heavy Bolter. It even outperforms the faster firing NEHoD by around 1.3-1.6X

Or in simpler terms, apply a 2-4X modifier, (1.3-1.6X for NEHoD), to the listed DPS of an Assault Cannon to determine it's actual Relative DPS. But in short a higher level same rarity Assault Cannon WILL out DPS the real DPS of the NEHoD in reality, regardless of listed values.

[Gorb]

And this is why I often say to ignore the DPS values as they're generally misleading. You get a much better understanding of how effective weapons are by learning how effective they are against different armour types.

[gimrah]

It's not just the damage that makes NEHoD so good. It's the suppression and, even better, the knockback. Which means melee attackers will never get to him and he can hold off whole armies if he has a good position.

I find assault cannons a bit meh in comparison. What it does mean though, is that if you're likely to be surrounded, e.g. in destroy-the-nests nid missions in vanilla, you'd rather go termie for the melee protection - and if you do then assault cannon is viable. But if I want heavy weapons on a melee-resistant platform, then Thule is usually the better choice. So personally I find termie Avitus doesn't really have a role.

Related point, there's a purple HB that fires dragonfire bolts (AoE). The headline DPS is much lower than NEHoD though of course it ignores cover, but has anyone found it to be effective against mobs not in cover? I don't know if dragonfire bolts have real AoE that makes them kick-ass against mobs or whether it's just a tiny notional AoE to make it ignore cover.

[Carl]

It's not just the damage that makes NEHoD so good. It's the suppression and, even better, the knockback. Which means melee attackers will never get to him and he can hold off whole armies if he has a good position.

Except he's never going to hit a whole squad with every salvo and melee units have charge or leap affects. I've seen it concistantly FAIL to do what you describe.

In addittion with Tarkus around you don't need the knockback to keep the enemy away from him, so the knockback is entierly incedental. It's a nice extra, but it's no substitute for raw DPS.

Regarding "X damage to all nearby enemies effects" that many weapons have. Hint: The range is pitiful and will onyl hit other members of the same squad in general. In other wrods they're pretty poor in terms of extra DPS.

[gimrah]

@Carl

I don't have this problem with NEHoD. Certainly in the vanilla campaign defence missions, it keeps all enemies back to at least 2/3 range, which is out of leaping range generally. Gaunts and banshees weren't a problem. Certainly when the enemy are coming down the same path and are bunched. If you have two enemies aproaching from either end of his firing arc, then maybe it's different.

I definitely find that Avitus with NEHoD can keep back a horde of rushers pretty effectively. Whereas, while termie Avitus will do some damage as they close, it's not usaully enough to stop the enemy breaking the line and getting into melee - or at least flanking out of firing arc. Certainly on Primarch, where the enemy take a fair amount of killing.

[Carl]

I definitely find that Avitus with NEHoD can keep back a horde of rushers pretty effectively. Whereas, while termie Avitus will do some damage as they close, it's not usaully enough to stop the enemy breaking the line and getting into melee - or at least flanking out of firing arc. Certainly on Primarch, where the enemy take a fair amount of killing.

Except as i pointed out there never breaking the line anyway because they're all going after Tarkus.

And yes I am talking about enemies not approaching line astern when talking about squads getting through. Even a single squad can do it if they come in line astern as they aren’t bunched up enough to all fall into the firing pattern.

I also never play the higher 2 difficulty levels. I'm simply not interested in making a game who's fun level is already marginal downright frustrating.

[gimrah]

Higher _two_ difficulties? It's probably fair to say best tactics are going to be pretty different between sergeant and primarch. Like players of captain and below seem often not to use Cyrus, whereas in primarch he's your first pick most of the time.
So, yeah, your advice might hold in sergeant. But people should beware the differences at the higher difficulties.

In primarch, if you can keep the horde from getting to Tarkus even, that's to be preferred. Admittedly as you go through the game he does become increasingly beastly - but you deal more damage and take less if you keep the enemy at arm's length (unless you use melee Tarkus of course).

Also, your problem is negated if your have any of your other squads on hand to mop up the odd attacker that somehow isn't knocked back or suppressed and killed (won't be many). Usually FC or Thad. And yes, Tarkus / taunt works nicely too. Also Thule smacking the ground. Or Jonah with avenger. So really anyone.

[alucard81]

Playing through a old game save of vanilla in Captain. and I must say it hurts with green gear.

The nerfs to the armor, nerfs to ironhalo, nerfs to thunderhammer dmg. Makes FC quite squishy. Against the boss units. The FC will barely last 4 seconds before he is sync killed.

The defence missons against the nids are really tough (much tougher). VC broods, bs broods, devourer raveners all come in a wave of range death. Cyrus becomes more and more important because he blows stuff up so efficiently.

I got a question though, I keep reading about a unlimited heal from Cyrus. Is that referring to the soft target trait?

[2marston]

Unlimited heal probably relates to the ability he gets for being pure in chaos rising. Medkits become an energy use item instead of needing the packs.

You lose this ability if his corruption is 4 or higher.

[alucard81]

HOLY JAMOLI!!!!

I need to go replay again. >.< I keep the pack on FC all the time.......

[gimrah]

Yeah, it's handy that. It's just unfortunate you have to leave some explosives behind (helped slightly by the fact the grenade launcher can fire blind grenades).

@alucard - can't say I noticed much difference in primarch. But then, with termie armour improved, it made more sense to have most people in that most of the time. Before and now, the overall ease of a campaign is materially affected by how soon you get NEHoD and Twin Testament of War.

[konfeta]

Hmm, Assault Cannons are cheating. In practice, I find that NeHoD completely outperforms any Assault Cannon with regular attacking, but upon activating Focus Fire, the AC gains an insane boost to damage compared to NeHoD.

Also, are you sure that listed damage does not take into account base weapon accuracy? I know it does not react to accuracy bonuses from equipment, but only god knows how those are added exactly. Despite that, the damage output # is a fairly accurate indicator on how much damage the weapon does per second.

[Makenshi]

HOLY JAMOLI!!!!

I need to go replay again. >.< I keep the pack on FC all the time.......

Yes, it's impressive and handy (borderline imba, actually), but wait until you see Cyrus deploy mines in PACKS by using ENERGY (I filled the whole map with it in the Rescue Techmarine mission :D

[MDragoon]

The choice is really up to what you want to use avitus for Role wise within your teams. If you have him use the NeHoD, he is your go to guy for infantry blobs. Higher rate of fire and the aoe damage does stack quite nicely, as well as being able to sustain fire for longer, also while the aoe damage effect may not be large, it seems to do some sort of explosive type damage because it performs very well against heavy armor and vehicles when it kicks in, so it makes the NeHoD good vs almost everything I can see.

While the relative dps may be higher for the assault cannon, the ability triggers make the NeHoD not a bad decision if looking for a semi-balanced team.

Also, the gear setup for NeHoD avitus seems more pleasing for crowd clearing then selective heavy infantry nuking. There's a seal that adds 1.5 energy regen, an armor that adds almost 2, and the NeHoD itself. You can have Avitus at almost full energy in 15 seconds while using it, making the dps for the NeHoD that much more impressive, and causes the rate of fire to increase which means more "explosive" shots fired. Also the range damage boost on said armor almost nullifies the difference in damage you get on the assault cannons.

[gimrah]

NeHoD has knockback, which makes is a must-have for defense missions, especially against nids.

In CR, I think CSM count as heavy infantry, so NeHoD is less effective. But there are fewer of them, so that's when AC comes into its own.

In theory, it should also mean multimeltas are even better than AC on Thule, but it doesn't seem to make much difference. Aesthetically, hellfire barrage is more satisfying than melta-sweep, although Thule running up to a CSM and melta-blasting at point blank until he explodes is quite satisfying.

[Gorb]

NeHoD works wonders with a full Ranged tree, Battle Lust (the Energy Trait) and a coupla Stamina Traits. Mainly, all you need is the full Ranged tree (instakilling infantry targets under 20% health combined with no setup time - turns the Heavy Bolter into a Heavy Raping Cannon™).

Combine this with a melee-orientated Tarkus with the upgraded Taunt (that forces all enemies to not only engage him, but engage him in melee ignoring their ranged weapons) and you have a mobile Turret that never needs to reload that also never runs out of Energy even with Focus Fire activated (as long as you're killing infantry). Even if he gets in combat, just Sprint! away.